The One that Suits her Best
by Kanae Layleeah
Summary: My first fanfic! Just a small piece I added around the time Akane's hair got the cut of its life. What was the real reason for her to stop liking Dr. Tofu? Not really a story in itself, but rather a delve into characters' minds.


Author's Note: Hey there, this is the first ONESHOT I've ever written, I hope you guys like it, but first I've got to explain a bit. On episode 9 of Ranma ½, (English dubbed version, but I suppose both versions would be the same at this point) right after Ranma had called Akane's new haircut cute, (wasn't that scene just the cutest?) they show a scene with Ryoga and that old woman that he was helping her find her grandson's house. After the commercial break, they show a new scene with Ryoga in front of the Tendo Dojo on a rainy night. He then has a flashback explaining how he had finally gotten there. Knowing Ryoga, and judging by the fact that he had travelled all Japan, I suppose he had taken at least a couple of days to get to the dojo after the old woman's incident. Hence I am adding a part I imagined happening on the next day after Akane's new haircut… considering it was just a normal day and the day Ryoga had attacked Ranma in the middle of the night was the following night. I hope I've explained myself fully!

Title:

The One that Suits her Best

"Okay everyone, it's time for breakfast!" Kasumi melodious voice rang.

It was a cloudy morning in Nerima. Over the Tendo Dojo, everything seemed casual… for their standards of ordinariness, of course. Already wearing her school uniform, Akane went down the stairs holding her school bag loosely. She headed for the tea room, where her father Soun, uncle Genma, and sister Nabiki, were already gathered around the table. Kasumi had just brought in the rice cooker when Akane had taken her place with her back to the koi pond.

"Say, where's Ranma?" Nabiki asked indifferently.

"That sloppy boy, he didn't even wake up for a work out this morning. I will surely make him exercise double after school today," Genma said disapprovingly.

"Why didn't you wake him up, my dear friend Saotome?" Soun asked grabbing his chopsticks.

"Wake him up? There are times his sleep is so heavy that not even cold water would wake him up, Tendo my friend," he answered while picking some pickles from a small plate set on the middle of the table, yet everyone could bet he could not have bothered getting a work out that morning either.

"Like father like son I always say, eh Saotome?"

"Was that really necessary, Tendo?"

"Poor Ranma, he must be extremely tired…" Kasumi commented, ignoring the men's babbling.

"You're right Kasumi, he must have found it difficult to fall asleep last night," Nabiki said as she remembered how she always took advantage of those situations to take pictures of him in his girl form. If only she had noticed earlier today...

"I wonder why?" Kasumi asked.

"Guilt, I suppose," Mr. Saotome remarked.

"But, guilt for what?"

"What, you're telling me you don't know? It was his fault Akane got her short haircut back, you know," Nabiki said dully.

"How come?"

"Ranma and that Hibiki boy were fighting… let's just say Akane's hair got in the way…"

"A challenger, eh?" Soun asked approvingly, not even caring that her daughter's hair had gotten the cut of its life. It seemed he was proud of Ranma's rivalry with other strong men.

"Oh my…" was all Kasumi could manage. "Wait a minute," she continued, "what do you mean by that Nabiki? I can remember that Akane told me she wanted the new haircut. Why _did _you say that then, Akane?" she directed the conversation now to her youngest sister.

"Ahm… ehm… well… I was thinking of getting it cut anyway," Akane answered sincerely from behind her chopsticks.

"Don't want to put the blame on your Ranma dear, eh little sis?" Nabiki rolled her eyes.

"THAT'S NOT IT!" Akane snapped, while both Genma and Soun snickered with excitement. She tried to change the subject, "Either way, he better wake up soon because I'm not going to afford getting late to school today."

"Haha," Nabiki laughed cynically. "Anyway, thanks for breakfast sis," she said, placing her empty bowl on the table and standing up.

"So soon already?"

"I've got something to take care of…" She left the room without another word.

They continued eating their breakfast in silence, as Akane wondered what Nabiki was in such a hurry for.

"Akane, why don't you go wake him up?" Kasumi asked sweetly.

This comment certainly caught Akane off-guard. "Who?"

"Why, Ranma, of course. You'll be late otherwise. You could finish breakfast later." She simply beamed.

"Ugh, alright," Akane agreed reluctantly as she excused herself from the table and stood up.

"No need to excuse yourself, Akane dear. You'll have to do this practically every day once you and Ranma are finally married," Soun said approvingly.

"What?" her eyes widened in horror.

"Mind you Akane, you better put up with that from now and get used to it. Take it as bridal training," Genma said laughing happily.

"Oh yeah, you don't say?" she answered insipidly. A moment later, Soun and Genma were both soaking wet, only that Genma was now Mr. Panda. Walking at elephant pace, she dropped the glass of water she had taken from the table and left for her fiancé's room.

On her way there, she mused about her father and uncle Saotome's awkward behavior, _'Honestly, what's the matter with those two, trying to get us married at all costs? It's not as if we've agreed to this – not yet anyway –…' _Her thoughts were interrupted though when she noticed Nabiki coming out from her room holding her school bag and a camera.

"I thought you were heading for school," Akane commented eyeing her sister's camera suspiciously.

"Are you going to wake him up?" Nabiki pretended not to have heard her.

"Kasumi told me to," she said to avoid one of her sister's awkward comments. "Whose pictures did you take?"

"No, I didn't take pictures of Ranma if that's what you think," Nabiki said.

"Oh yeah, you expect me to believe that?"

"Not yet, I hadn't... but I guess I'm too late," she said disappointedly and sighed. She kept on walking past Akane's way, and went down the stairs gloomily.

Akane gave a deep sigh back and slid Ranma's door open. As for Ranma, there he was… snoring loudly and sleeping like a baby with his arms outstretched like a gorilla's. He was wearing some black cotton-made singlet and red boxers, which did the best job at showing his fit muscles. She ignored the latter detail, though, and stood up beside him, calling his name to wake him up.

"Ranma, Ranma…" she hushed.

She tried raising her voice, but he was too deeply asleep to actually hear her. She sat down next to his futon with great force and started shaking him around.

"Ranma, wake up already!" she yelled.

Nevertheless, all he did was stir, so his face was now towards Akane. At least he had stopped snoring.

"Dummy," she muttered, poking his forehead in anger with her index finger. He did not even stir this time.

She crossed her arms across her chest while considering actually splashing him with a bucket full of cold water. Just when she was about to give up, she noticed his nose was slightly bruised. It was very faint, but it looked kind of greenish. She wondered what could have possibly been the cause of this.

_/Flashback/: Akane throwing several books at Ranma, who was hanging upside down from the roof outside her bedroom in his girl form._

She could not help but laugh at what she had done, having hit him so harshly. Well, at least he could surely handle a blow in the face. Funny, she bet her life that any other normal person would have gotten an extremely worse reaction to such… but not Ranma, with his 'tough skin and healing ability of a dragon'… She _had _thought about those words sarcastically, yet could not help feeling a touch of jealousy.

She traced the green line on his face with her index finger unconsciously. When her finger reached his forehead, he stirred once again, and now faced the ceiling. His left cheek was sort of purplish too, no wonder from the slap he had gotten from her the previous day. '_This one was his fault alright, he had offered! Hmm… but he actually did apologize… and had called me cute nonetheless…'_ She placed her palm on his cheek, as if caressing the bruise would make it go away. '_Well, it was not as if he had actually meant the compliment, nor as if he was the type of guy that was actually nice enough to mean something like that...'_

She grunted in despair, unaware of what she was thinking about or what was going on inside her head. Her gaze followed the rest of his body, focusing on his well-built arms the most. Then, she noticed something; his futon looked slightly lumpy on several areas…

"Akane?" a male voice called. Apparently that grunt of hers had done the trick.

She blushed slightly, remembering her hand was still caressing his face, and completely forgetting about the futon. She had to think of a way to cover up for that – and fast.

"Wake up idiot, you've got less than twenty minutes to get ready for school," she mumbled, slapping his cheek continuously. She was lucky that it was normal for her to hit him all the time.

"Stop it already, would you?" he exclaimed, holding her hand to bring it to a halt. He sat on his futon and then stared at her with tired irritated eyes.

She looked at her hand clutched in his momentarily, and then shook it to break away from his grip. "Hem," she moaned and turned away to prevent him from noticing her embarrassment.

"Gee, Akane, what was that for?" he retorted, oblivious to it all since he had just woken up.

"I told you already, you dummy. There's no time and I've been here trying to wake you up for ten minutes already."

"And that was the only way you could think of, hurting me in my sleep?" he asked bewildered.

"It was that, or throwing a bucket of cold water on your face," she rolled her eyes.

"I should've figured, a stupid tomboy like you wouldn't know how to wake people up soothingly," he grumbled.

"What did you just say? You know, I guess it's my fault for actually bothering to wake you up." She shrugged her shoulders and shook her head furiously. At that, she was expecting her long hair to rest on her shoulder as she tended to do with it whenever she was mad… having forgotten it was no longer long. On reflex, she outstretched her hand to get a hold of it, only to finally end up remembering that it was not there anymore.

Ranma stared back at her with a puzzled expression until he finally noticed her mistake… practically at the same instant she herself had figured it out too. He tried to get a view of her eyes, but her bangs were covering them. Sighing, Akane stood up and headed for the door.

'_Darn it, I knew she would still sulk about that,'_ he mused. "Akane, wait!" he called.

"What is it now?" she said calmly, still not looking at him and stopping in front of the door.

He had certainly expected her voice to sound melodramatic or squeaky at least, and was surprised when he noticed it did not. "I just wanted to say that… ehm…"

"Yeah, what is it Ranma?" she insisted.

'_C'mon, you said it yesterday, you can say it again! You said it yesterday, didn't you?'_ he pondered as he tried to gather up the courage to tell her something. _'What's so different out of a sudden? It's not like you actually _mean_ it or nothing…'_

"I'm waiting," she answered rather impatiently.

"Ehm, ahh…" Perhaps it was better if he just did not comment about that for now.

"Ehm, ahh, what?" she demanded.

"There's no need for you to get all sulky about it. It'll grow back eventually, you know," he finally said hopelessly, having given up on saying his original statement.

She remained silent expecting him to continue talking… or having entirely misinterpreted him.

'_Darn, I shouldn't have said that…'_ Ranma mused. "Ehm, what I mean is that I've got some secret Saotome remedies my old man keeps using for faster," he gulped, "_hair _growth, but of course they don't work with him since he actually _has no hair_ to begin with… I could give you some."

He was anticipating a slap, but yet again, her attitude surprised him. She turned around staring at Ranma disappointedly as she said, "But I thought you liked me better with short hair."

"Wha – what?" inadvertently, he blushed deeply.

"Why would you offer me a tonic for hair growth then?" Akane practically whispered.

Akane, Ranma could not help noticing, or imagining, had said the last sentence rather gloomily. "I figured that it didn't matter what I thought… after all it's _your _choice," he answered.

"My choice?" she repeated taken aback.

"Yeah well…" he started scratching the back of his head, "Dr. Tofu liked your haircut, but still…" he then stopped in mid-sentence.

And when had this become about Dr. Tofu? Akane knew that if it involved having long hair it _did_ involve Dr. Tofu, but that was something no one else knew other than her… unless Ranma had noticed by himself, which she completely doubted. "Oh I see Ranma, I had forgotten; you didn't mean it when you said you liked me better with short hair," she said indifferently.

"Shut up! I meant what I said that time, okay?" Ranma snapped rashly without thinking.

"Is that so?" she raised her right eyebrow.

"Ehm, ahh… I kind of thought he was sort of the reason for you letting your hair grow…"

'_Well, what do you know? This guy's actually got some brains in that thick skull of his,' _Akane pondered. "I told you already, or do I have to repeat myself twice around you? It's over. I don't care what he thinks about me anymore. I guess lately I really hadn't cared anyway… but I just took a while to figure that out. And if that's the case…" she approached him and stooped down to his level to face him, "there's no real need for the tonic, right?" she said smiling.

"Ehm, ahh…"

"It _is _a cute haircut, isn't it?" she smiled again sweetly as she caressed a chunk of hair.

"Ehm, ahh…"

"_You _do like me better with short hair, eh?"

"Ehm, ahh…" Had she emphasized on the _'you'_ or '_do_' on that sentence? When had she become so…

"Stop that already, you sound like a dummy." She giggled and headed for the door. "You've got fifteen minutes to get ready now. If you aren't down for breakfast in five minutes, I'll leave without you," she reminded him and left, unknowingly leaving a tomato faced Ranma behind.

"Ehm, ahh… Funny how a slight thoughtless comment could make this tomboy act so… ehm… _differently_…" he said to no one in particular. "But then again, if it brings out her nice side…" He stood up and took the jars that were hidden under his futon to put them away. But as he placed them in order inside the drawer, he could not help thinking, '_It really isn't anymore Dr. Tofu's opinion that she cares about… I guess it is not about giving up on Dr. Tofu either, but rather finding someo-… – eh, something – that suits her best.'_

**THE END**

Author's Note: Weird you think? Get used to it if you're going to read my stories ;-). I'm aware they had been all cute over each other the previous day, but some extra fluff never hurts, right? *Crosses fingers and hopes you guys think the same* If you think it sounds very _'unRanmaish'_ that he noticed why Akane let her hair grow so long, then think about it this way: he was the only one who saw her crying in front of Dr. Tofu, so he sort of put the two things together and came out with the conclusion that she was aiming at looking more like Kasumi. Plus, even Akane once told him, _'So I'm not all dainty and delicate like Kasumi, big deal!'_ so he figured she was somehow jealous. And in case you were not satisfied with my writing, I'll state it bluntly: Even if he ignores it later on, Ranma knew that Akane stopped liking Dr. Tofu, not because she had 'given up on Tofu', but rather because she had started liking Ranma instead. (Please, if you're pressing that cute **Review** button, don't forget to** rate my story from 1-6**, **1 being the lowest and 6 being the highest mark** ^_^)


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